Sunday, May 25, 2008

Phoenix Lander on Mars

Just before 8 p.m. Eastern time, mission controllers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory here received a radio signal from the Phoenix on the ground in the icy plains north of Mars' Arctic circle.

Because the signal was relayed via the Mars Odyssey orbiter, the controllers would have to wait another couple of hours, until Odyssey's next pass over the landing site, for additional word of the Phoenix's condition, including whether it had successfully unfolded its solar panels and possibly the first photographs. -- NYTimes.com

This is great stuff. You can watch realtime at NASA TV. The engineers at NASA never gave up on space. After getting saddled with teen-age neo-cons and other assorted Bush administration jackasses, after getting their budgets cut to virtually nothing. They kept building spacecraft. I worked at Kennedy Space Center, and I have to tell you these guys are some of the best engineers in the world and they love their jobs. The Kennedys are much in the news right now, and I have to say that one of JFK's greatest legacy's to the world has to be his interest in space and the moon race.